Stephen Colbert went out of his way to be mostly gracious to his CBS bosses in the months and weeks leading up to The Late Show’s finale in May.
Sure, he repeatedly joked on-air about the network canceling his show “for financial reasons,” and pushed back forcefully when CBS disputed his account of who made the call to move his interview with James Talarico to YouTube. The underlying message was clear enough: Colbert had reason to feel aggrieved.
But both on and off the air, he also made clear he saw little point in turning his final months into an acrimonious public feud with the network.
Even after taping his final episode, when Colbert took the mic off-air to address his staff and the celebrity guests still gathered onstage after “Hello, Goodbye,” he thanked CBS—then joked that only about 50% of what he’d said about the network on-air was true.
Since then, there have been cracks.
The latest surfaced last weekend, when—as LateNighter first reported—the show’s now-former writers room made a last-minute Emmy appeal with a homemade “DIY FYC ad” for Outstanding Writing for a Variety Series. The video itself was playful, styled like the opening credits to an ’80s sitcom. But the context around it was not: the writers framed the spot as something they made because CBS was not running an Emmy campaign “for us.”
A source close to the network has since rejected the writers’ claim, noting that CBS had run an FYC campaign for The Late Show, asking voters to consider the show “in all categories.”
It’s a small dispute, but a revealing one: even after the finale, both sides are still policing the story of what CBS did—or didn’t do—for The Late Show on its way out.
Both things can be true. CBS can have mounted a formal campaign for The Late Show. And the writers’ public message can still point to a more specific concern: whether a broad campaign for the show is the same thing as a dedicated push for its writers.
Complicating the optics further: Comics Unleashed with Byron Allen, which has replaced Colbert in CBS’ 11:35 p.m. time slot, was also among the 18 shows competing in first-round voting for Outstanding Variety Series.
That has been the uneasy dynamic around The Late Show since CBS announced its end. Everyone involved has reason to celebrate the show. Everyone involved also has reason to define the show’s legacy on their own terms.
The finale gave The Late Show an ending. What it did not give anyone was the last word.
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